by Kim Lock
‘But I said Ay practically lives with us, I see her every day. So I want her on my family tree. But she said I wasn’t allowed. That my tree had to be right. So I got angry and said . . .’ she mumbled something into her shoulder.
Elsie prompted nervously, ‘You said what?’
Millie picked up the pencil and began scribbling again, the strokes racing off the sides of the page. ‘I said family trees are stupid.’
Elsie exhaled with relief.
‘Then I had to sit in the corner while everyone else went out to play.’
Mille broke into sobs and Elsie’s relief turned into boggy, stomach-curling guilt.
For a brief time Elsie entertained a mental image of throttling Millie’s grade-four teacher. She could almost feel that high-buttoned collar beneath her fingers, the wrinkles on that dour face turning puce. Or maybe Elsie could strangle her with that large silver crucifix that always swung at her ruffled bosom. Then she remembered the strict Catholic nuns who had caned Elsie’s fingers for stumbling over words from her Catechism, and knew Millie had the small mercy of a so-called secular school at least.
But would that mercy extend to tolerance of a student’s mother who loved another adult – an adult of the same sex, at that – in addition to their lawfully wedded? With a sense of hot dread she recalled the prim, rebuking expression of Gloria Watson as she had removed Elsie from the knitting group. For suspected unbecoming behaviour.
‘If Aunty Ay isn’t a real aunty, like Aunt Rose and Aunt Lila, then who is she?’
Elsie looked down at the scribbles across her daughter’s page, the indecipherable mess. How apt it was.
‘She’s Mum and Dad’s friend. Sort of like an aunty, only not related by blood.’
‘I tried to explain that to Mrs Mabel, but she said it didn’t make sense.’
Elsie took in Millie’s indignant face, the tear-stained tracks on her cheeks. If a teacher could humiliate and punish Millie for mislabelling an aunty, how would a teacher react if they discovered a child’s parents often shared a bed with an extra woman? Found out that woman was also a parent to the child, shaping her growth, influencing the way she learned about the world?
Millie picked up her pencil and tapped it on the page. ‘Mum? What is she?’
Elsie wanted to tell her the truth. She realised she wanted Millie to understand, so that if she understood, it would be easier for Millie to keep it to herself. But how could she do that to such a young child? She pictured Millie at school today, tucked into the corner of the classroom, facing the wall and weeping while listening to her friends playing outside, the heartless taunts and jeers of the other students. Millie could face a lifetime of such ridicule and exile. Or worse – what if the teacher told the authorities?
The children might be taken away from them.
Just like Aida’s baby had been taken away from her.
Elsie’s body went cold. No, there was no way she could explain it to Millie. The only way to protect her child was if Millie simply did not know the truth. What she did not know could not hurt her.
So Elsie lied.
‘Ay is just my friend, that’s all. Aunty is a nickname.’
‘A nickname?’
‘Exactly. Like how your name is Millicent Eloise, but we call you Millie. Or sometimes honey.’
‘So-o-o,’ Millie said slowly, ‘what do I tell Mrs Mabel?’
‘You don’t have to tell her anything. You have a mum and a dad, and you have aunties and Uncle David.’
‘Where do I put Ay?’
Elsie looked down at the page of angry scribbles. She touched her fingertips to the grooves where Millie’s pencil had pressed so hard it had embossed the paper.
‘You can leave Ay off the tree, honey.’
‘But I don’t want to leave Ay off my family tree.’
‘I know you don’t. But it’s a family tree, and Ay isn’t . . .’ she paused, gathered herself. ‘Ay isn’t family.’
So this is what self-loathing feels like, Elsie thought.
60
Thomas was only thirty-eight when the country changed forever.
It was a Tuesday afternoon in late 1975, and although he enjoyed the opportunity to speak to customers in the shop these days – a welcome break from the telephone that seemed welded to his ear and the desk chair welded to his rear – when yet another customer came into the store and remained unattended for several minutes, wandering like a lost sheep through the rows of refrigerators, Thomas grew irritated. Where was Hank or Murray?
‘Excuse me,’ Thomas said to his customer, an older lady looking for a toaster. ‘I must get someone to help serve.’ Leaving the lady to browse, he quickly assured the other two waiting customers that he would find someone to assist them, and strode out the back of the shop.
He expected to find Hank and Murray hidden behind the warehouse door, smoking, but the smoking spot was empty. In fact the entire warehouse, as he hurried through it, looked completely abandoned. A trolley with a cargo of boxes was stalled in the middle of the aisle; an opened toolbox, spanners strewn across the concrete floor, was abandoned by the rear door.
‘Where the bloody hell is everyone?’
Then Thomas heard a noise. A shouted curse; raised voices. It was coming from the lunch room.
‘What the –?’ He stormed into the room. ‘I’ve got three customers out there waiting . . .’
All six of his staff – his salesmen Hank and Murray, his senior travelling salesman Peter Van DerVerg, Don from accounts, Jake the young bloke and general dogsbody, even Martha the secretary – were crowded around the wireless. The volume was turned up loud and a cacophony of irate voices was streaming out.
‘What’s going on?’
Rather furiously, Martha shushed him. Thomas didn’t have enough time to register his shock that Martha – mild, studious and polite Martha, who had worked for him for three years and never so much as sneezed out of turn – was scowling and hissing at him, because Hank piped up excitedly, ‘They’ve sacked him.’
‘Who?’
‘Whitlam. They sacked Whitlam.’
Thomas said, ‘The prime minister?’ and was met with more fevered silencing. He pushed in closer to the wireless and listened.
A man was speaking rapidly, official-sounding and determined. Shouts of ‘hear, hear’ punctuated the background.
‘Is this parliament?’ Thomas asked.
‘Yeah,’ Hank said, grinning. ‘Live broadcast. Interrupted the program and everything.’
‘So we’re listening to Canberra? Right now?’
‘Yep.’
‘Whack-o.’
As Thomas listened to the broadcast he gleaned that sure enough, Whitlam had been sacked, his job yanked right out from under him. The governor-general had slipped in and commissioned the leader of the opposition as prime minister instead.
‘It won’t pass,’ Peter was saying. ‘They’ll have to dissolve both houses. We’ll be back to an election in no time.’
‘Christ.’ Thomas whistled.
‘Bit bloody harsh though, unseating an elected PM,’ Hank said. ‘Doesn’t seem right.’
‘What choice did he have?’ Murray broke in. ‘The senate’s been blocked up like a bung dunny for months.’
‘That’s not Whitlam’s problem though, is it?’ Thomas argued. ‘That’s the opposition being stubborn bastards.’
Despite Martha’s best attempts to remain focussed on the radio broadcast, the lunch room erupted into debate. Don thought it was about time – Whitlam had been racking up debt left, right and centre. Thomas and Hank argued that regardless, the people elected a prime minister, not the governor-general. Jake, the young bloke, said his dad’s mates had long hated Whitlam – making it easier for wives to piss off on their husbands and giving land away to blacks. Murray grew red in the face as he poin
ted out it was Whitlam who brought the troops home and freed the draft resisters who’d been jailed simply for refusing to die in someone else’s war. And besides, Murray finished, Aborigines were here first.
Thomas knew that Murray was right. It was because of Whitlam that his brother David had been brought home from Vietnam. David hadn’t been drafted – seemingly unable to keep a girl, he’d joined up voluntarily. Spent eighteen months with the Army up there in the stinking hot jungle. Thomas thought of David as he used to be – easygoing, bold, affable – then he thought of David now and knew his brother was different. Like a fundamental part of him had changed, something in his personality. Shellshock, they started to call it after World War I. But it was different after Vietnam. Quieter, creeping-like and insidious.
The mood in the lunch room had become fervid. That such a thing could happen and the way it was brought straight to them, instant by instant as it unfolded, had shattered the routine of a workday. A few years of progressive governmental reform had stirred the country to its foundations. One minute a man could be running the country, the next he was just a slighted bloke in a fancy suit. Suddenly Thomas realised he hadn’t been grateful enough for all of his luck. He had taken everything – all of this – for granted.
Because how could a man ever know when it all might get pulled out from under him?
‘Boss,’ Murray broke into Thomas’s thoughts. ‘Surely you’re a Labor man.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘You just seem it.’
‘I’m blue collar, you reckon?’ Thomas said. ‘A union fellow?’ He shook his head. ‘Not that I reckon it’s any man’s business but his own, but I’m a swinging voter.’
Murray laughed. ‘A swinger, eh? Having your cake and eating it too.’
Unease prickled along Thomas’s spine. ‘What’s that now?’
‘Bloody swingers can never make up their mind.’ He grinned.
Thomas watched himself snap as though he had floated out of his own body. ‘Don’t be a dickhead,’ he said.
Murray’s eyes widened. ‘I was only –’
‘You were only standing around, slacking and mouthing off. I should make you turn that damn radio off and get back to work.’
Hank cleared his throat; Murray, red-faced, was now fascinated by the toe of his shoe. Jake, Peter, Don from accounts and Martha all stared straight at Thomas, dumbfounded.
‘Sorry, boss.’ Murray’s voice shook with humiliation. ‘I was just being a larrikin.’
What the hell had just happened? What had he done? His staff stood rigid with shock, his outburst clashing with the outraged voices on the radio. Five faces paled, one flamed. Thomas bristled with his own secrets, his own insecurity. Shame dug itself a hole in his guts and took up residence.
Thomas clapped a hand on Murray’s shoulder. The salesman looked startled until Thomas smiled at him.
‘You’re a card, mate,’ Thomas said, giving him a gentle shake. ‘Sorry to scare you, lad. I was joking, too.’
By the time Thomas returned to the showroom, the customers were long gone. Outside the street was deserted. Thomas, nursing his mortification, sent everyone home early. He closed the shop and went home to his children and his two women.
61
On account of the Riesling Aida had shared with Elsie at tea, Aida was already tipping slightly away from sober when there was a knock at the front door.
It was one of those delightful Friday evenings, the air pleasantly warm and sweet with summer. It was so delightful, in fact, that they were eating tea with the side door wide open, to let in the refreshing air.
Aida, Thomas, Elsie and the kids had almost finished tea when they heard the knocking.
Millie said, ‘I’ll get it,’ and jumped up.
Elsie glanced at the clock and frowned. ‘I thought Jenny wasn’t picking you up until seven thirty?’
Millie shrugged. ‘She might be early.’
Arthur said, ‘I want to go bowling too.’
Millie gave her brother a withering look.
Aida, last forkful of pumpkin halfway to her mouth, paused as the sound of an unfamiliar man’s voice murmured from the front door. Then came the sound of a woman’s voice, more familiar.
‘It’s Mrs Scott,’ Millie cried.
And so it was on that convivial Friday evening as the seventies came to a close that Sara Scott stood at their front door with an unfamiliar fellow, an armful of Nobby’s salted peanuts and an esky full of Victoria Bitter.
Aida stood, hurried around the table and crossed the lounge room. ‘What a surprise!’ she said, hugging Sara and kissing her cheek. ‘Bloody hell, you haven’t changed at all. And it’s been what, five years?’
‘Six!’ said Sara. She stood in a cloud of perfume, wearing a red mini-dress with long sleeves. Her hair was fluffed big and blow-waved back from her face. Six years ago Sara and her six children had moved out of the house across the street, and disappeared somewhere up in the north-west – to one of those placid fishing towns with a sun-crisped caravan park and a jetty that disappears into the eye-hurtingly blue sea.
Aida said, ‘And who’s this?’
‘Theodore Butler,’ the man said, giving Aida’s hand a lively shake. ‘Call me Teddy.’
‘My fiancé,’ said Sara, beaming. ‘Thanks to no-fault divorce.’
Teddy, in his early fifties, had weathered skin and dark brown eyes. Black hair, lined with silver, sat upon his head like a glossy upturned bowl. He wore a snug yellow t-shirt and brown bell-bottom pants tight enough to leave few secrets between them all.
‘Congratulations,’ Aida said, as Elsie and Thomas appeared behind her. Introductions were made, and Aida gently removed herself from the centre of the circle.
‘Look at us,’ Sara said. ‘We’ve interrupted your tea.’
‘Not at all,’ Elsie insisted. ‘Come, sit. Are you moving back?’ Lines of conversation rose up and fussed around each other as Elsie morphed into host and ushered the unexpected visitors into the kitchen: where they were staying in town, that they were only here for the weekend, how nice it was to be back in Gawler, and yes they would love something to drink, thank you very much.
‘Sorry to barge in unannounced,’ Sara was saying, ‘but it’s such a nice evening. Teddy asked if I had any local friends, and he insisted we come for a visit.’ She gave a slightly embarrassed laugh. As Aida took the bags of nuts and potato chips from her hands, Sara winked at her.
‘I knew I’d find you here. Been a while, huh?’
Aida smiled and nodded.
The light held and held in the sky as though it was reluctant to see the day end, and there was nothing for the gregarious promise of the evening but to move outdoors. Folding chairs were taken out onto the lawn with the esky and there came the crack-fizz of bottle-tops removed while Aida, in the kitchen, poured peanuts and potato chips into bowls. Arthur was complaining that Millie got to go bowling while he had to stay home with the boring adults.
‘How come she can go wherever she wants?’ Arthur said.
‘Because she’s almost sixteen,’ Aida replied. ‘And you’re only nine.’ She tossed a peanut into her mouth and eyed the scene in the backyard, where Sara’s fiancé appeared to be telling a joke of an indelicate nature. Thomas gave a shout of laughter; Elsie covered her face with her hands and Sara slapped Teddy’s chest in a mock rebuke with the back of her hand.
‘That’s not fair,’ Arthur huffed.
‘I get it, kiddo.’
‘No, you don’t.’ Scowling, he crossed his arms and with his toe gave a chair a tentative shove. A prod at a boundary.
Aida lifted her eyebrows. ‘What would you like me to do about it?’
‘Can I have some ice cream?’
Aida looked at the unwashed plates on the sink. ‘You didn’t finish all your dinner.’
‘Y
eah, because they got here,’ he whined. ‘So now I can’t do what I want at all.’
‘It’s not bed time yet, you can do whatever you want,’ Aida said. ‘You just can’t have sweets or go bowling with your sister.’
Arthur glared at her. ‘Can I watch TV then?’
To this request, on top of his whining, Elsie or Thomas would have said no. They would have said that letting him watch TV was only rewarding bad behaviour. But right now, Aida wanted to go outside. She wanted to sit with her friends. Being an authoritarian to an irked nine-year-old was furthest from her desires right now. And with the way Arthur was glowering at her, she could sense the tantrum lurking not far below the surface; she could foresee the shouted, You’re not my mum! that almost every non-biological care-giver had heard, yet that felt, to Aida, like a scalpel to her flesh.
‘All right, go watch TV.’
Satisfied with the prospect of the new colour television all to himself, Arthur ran off into the lounge room.
Aida went outside. Out in the open air, the chairs were arranged in a circle with the esky and a card table in the centre. Aida set the snacks on the table. Thomas was sitting next to Elsie, leaning back in his chair with his elbows propped on the armrests, a stubbie cradled at his chest. Elsie sipped her beer neatly, setting it down on the grass between mouthfuls. Sara had butted her chair up to Teddy’s and she leaned across onto his shoulder; stretched out upon the esky, her bare legs were presented like a sacrificial offering for mosquitoes. Aida took the remaining spare chair next to Sara, who offered her a cigarette. She accepted and lit up gratefully, exhaling blue smoke towards the sky.
‘So, Aida, you live there?’ Teddy pointed next door.
‘That’s me,’ Aida said, looking over. Above the fence the window tops were black. In the dying light the house looked unoccupied and Aida wanted to go over and turn the lights on. She prepared herself for the spiel of a widow, but was pleasantly surprised when Teddy didn’t raise the issue of a husband at all.
‘Nice neighbours,’ Teddy observed with a grin.